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* Stocks set for weekly gains on recovery hopes
* Alibaba slips despite upbeat earnings report
* Splunk jumps after forecasting higher cloud demand
* Futures mixed: Dow up 0.09%, S&P up 0.09%, Nasdaq off
0.10%
(Adds comment, details, updates prices)
By Ambar Warrick and Pawel Goraj
May 22 (Reuters) - U.S. stock indexes were set for a
near-flat open on Friday as investors weighed hopes of more
stimulus to revive an ailing economy against simmering Sino-U.S.
trade tensions.
China on Friday unveiled details about its plan to impose a
national security law in Hong Kong that could see mainland
intelligence agencies set up bases in the global financial hub,
raising fears of more pro-democracy protests. Reports of the law on Thursday had drawn fire from President
Donald Trump, toppling Wall Street's main indexes from
multi-month highs that were hit on optimism around a revival in
business activity with the easing of coronavirus-led lockdowns.
"Market sentiment is really vulnerable to expensive
valuation at the moment," said Andrea Cicione, head of strategy
at TS Lombard.
"After the shock of the COVID-19 lockdown, we have to go
through a regular recession with high unemployment, low capex,
low demand and that's not what's priced in at the moment."
At 8:37 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis 1YMcv1 were up 21 points, or
0.09%. S&P 500 e-minis EScv1 were up 2.5 points, or 0.09% and
Nasdaq 100 e-minis NQcv1 were down 9 points, or 0.1%.
A swathe of mixed retail earnings from Walmart Inc WMT.N ,
Best Buy Co Inc BBY.N and Home Depot Inc HD.N earlier in the
week had shown online shopping gaining traction due to the
stay-at-home orders.
On Friday, Chinese e-commerce behemoth Alibaba Group
BABA.N reported a better-than-expected quarterly profit, but
its shares slipped 1.6%. Smaller rival Pinduoduo Inc's
U.S.-listed shares PDD.O gained 1.2% after its own upbeat
quarterly earnings report. Hewlett Packard Enterprise HPE.N fell 7.3% after missing
second-quarter revenue and profit estimates, hit by global
lockdowns since February. Data analytics software maker Splunk Inc SPLK.O rose 5.8%
after saying it expects higher demand for its cloud services as
people around the world take to working from home.